– Transcript 146
16th March, 1992
R: Good evening. (Good evening Robert.) It is a pleasure to be with you once again. It is a privilege to be with you. To see your nice shining faces. Everyone staring at me. (laughter) Having all these thoughts in your head. Thinking about all kinds of morbid things.
SH: Oh go on. (laughs)
R: Go on. All is well. (pause) In this age there are many Jnanis, Sages, spiritual teachers being churned out. They’re all over the place. The 1990s is the year of the Jnanis.
(students laugh) Someone is always telling me of a new Jnani in town. This is all good there is nothing wrong with this. There is nothing wrong with anything. Everyone has their place. Everyone is doing what they’re supposed to be doing. As the observer you should not react to anything you should just watch, observe, look intelligently at the world, at the universe, see what’s happening and be happy.
In any event there are many schools of Advaita Vedanta that teach that the universe is Maya and illusion. Yet when asked where did this Maya come from? Why is there Maya? Why is there illusion? And many teachers say that this is a great mystery. It’s a great mystery they’re told. For they’re told, students are told that this will confuse you and confound you. So it’s better not to think about it. Yet you have to know what’s going on.
A Jnani is a being that has become all of these things, Maya, creation, everything.
Therefore an answer is forthcoming. Confusion, to be confounded is a good thing. I love to confound you and confuse you. It is like a Zen koan.
When you come up with the answer of a zen koan satori or nirvana ensues. It is the same thing with answers like this that confound you and confuse you in Advaita Vedanta. For what happens is the brain sort of explodes. The mind diminishes. You begin to feel and see things you never felt and saw before. Every question has an answer. There is no such thing as saying it’s a mystery or it will confuse you or confound you.
We have discussed these things before. Creation is Maya, illusion. Yet who caused the illusion. Where did this Maya come from? Who can tell me?
Fred (SF): Inside the individual? (R: Inside of the individual. How did it get there?) It didn’t really start?
SH: It came from nowhere. It’s just appearing, it doesn’t really exist. (R: Exactly.) SV: But actually the illusion is that there seems to be an illusion.R: The illusion is an illusion. Maya never existed. It does not exist. This sounds strange to many of us but it’s the truth. (SG: You call that an answer?) (students laugh) That’s the answer you’re going to get whether you like it or not. (laughter) There is no Maya. There is no illusion. It is like you are dreaming and you wake up. What happened to the dream it never existed, it appeared to have existed. But there was no place, no room, no space where it existed. It is like the water in a mirage. It appears real but it doesn’t exist. Again you question, “Well why does it appear to exist?” It doesn’t.
It never did. No thing exists.
Yet we appear to be mortal. We appear to be alive. We appear to be looking at a world. Or beauty out there. Flowers the sky, trees yet in reality, it’s not there. You’re not there. No thing is there. As long as you identify with the body you can never really know this. For the body-mind phenomena keeps you guessing, evaluating, trying to solve problems. There is no problem to solve. Because there never was anything wrong or right.
Can’t you see when you are a student of Advaita Vedanta when you’re really sincere about this. You are wasting your time to try to solve problems. I don’t care what the problem may be. It is a mistake to try to solve these problems. For when you say you are trying to solve a problem you believe the problem is true, it’s real, it exists. Which means it can only turn into another problem. There is no end to it. It never finishes.
This is why I say to Drop it! Do not carry it around. Do not think about it. Do not consider it. Do not give it any power. You are the one who gives it the power. For you consider it, you ponder it, you evaluate it, you try to change it, to remove it.
As an example, say your feelings have been hurt. Who’s feelings, what feelings.
You have no feelings. To have feelings you have to be a human being. Are you a human being? (laughter) What are you? (laughter) You’re a nothing. An absolute nothing. Yet nothing also doesn’t exist. But the question will arise, “Where did nothing come from?”
(laughter) Nothing didn’t come from any place because it never existed.
Yet when you use words you have to say you’re nothing. When you think about this you become radiantly happy. You become happy because there are no thoughts. There are no solutions, there are no answers. There is nothing you have to become or do. You just have to stop thinking. Stop trying to solve problems. Stop trying to soothe your hurt feelings, drop it! Leave it alone. Do not look for answers. It is the only way to be happy. As soon as you start talking or thinking happiness eludes you. True happiness is no thing.
What is happiness made out of? Most of you believe it is something that turns you on. Makes you happy. But this is not really happiness. This is only part of the illusion that you believe in. That you believe will make you radiantly happy. And after a time it will change and you’ll become miserable. For no thing in this world or in this universe can bring you perfect happiness.
You have to become totally empty. The question always arises, “Where did the emptiness come from?” As long as I think about being empty, again I’m deluded. If you can think about it it’s not the truth. If you can discuss it, it’s not the truth. If you think
you’ve got a point or an answer it’s not the truth. There are no answers because there are no questions.
People search all over the world. For their happiness. For the right teacher. For peace of mind. Yet there is no such thing. There is no peace of mind. There is no happiness.
For there is nowhere from which they came. There would have to be a source of happiness or a source of peace. There’d have to be a source of wisdom. Yet if there is a source for these things, from where did the source come from? How did the source come into existence? Can’t you see now that whatever you think about is wrong? Whatever you see whatever you say is wrong.
You may not agree with me. Good. But what do you agree with? As long as you’ve got your own story you’re wrong. As long as you’ve got your own beliefs, your own system, you’re wrong. Yet where did the wrong come from? To be wrong you need a source from where the wrong comes from. Therefore no one is wrong. No one is right. No one is.
No one. Silence.
Many of us are making tremendous progress in this group and I’m really proud of you. You are beginning to understand there is absolutely nothing to say. There is nothing to correct. There is no one to love or to hate. There is absolutely nothing. All is well.
When I say, “All is well,” do not try to qualify that statement. If you were only able to accept “All is well,” for what it’s worth, nothing, you would instantly be awakened. But whenever I make the statement to you and I say, “All is well,” immediately your mind starts thinking about this, doesn’t it? You’re saying, “If you only knew my problems? If Robert only knew what is going on in my life. I can’t find a job. My house burned down.
This happened, that happened. I’ve got cancer of the eyeballs.” So what! Now I don’t mean any disrespect when I say, “So what,” if you’re suffering. But the truth is, so what! (laughter) So what really means it’s not this and it’s not that. It’s not right, it’s not wrong. It’s not good, it’s not bad. Do not look at yourself as a body. Do not look at others as bodies. Do not look at the universe as an entity. Just learn to be spontaneous. Watch, observe, look and do nothing. We have to get to that point.
Think of how many times your feelings were hurt today. Think how many times you felt sorry for yourself. Think how many times you believed something is wrong somewhere. You watched the news on TV. If you watch the news on TV you’re crazy.
(laughter) You’re out of your mind. (laughter) There is total chaos and confusion going on.
Every Time I turn the TV on I just have to laugh. Everybody is taking everything so seriously. They’re running around killing one another. Fighting for the president of the United States. All of these things have been going on and they’ve been going on since the beginning of time. Nothing has changed. And people never learn.
I suppose if we live long enough like five, six thousand years these things would not bother us any longer because we’ve seen them before. We’ve seen them over and over and over again if you were five thousand years old. You would have seen wars, man’s inhumanity to man, destruction, chaos, cataclysms again and again and again and again and it wouldn’t phase you.
But because you were born in this century and you’re only seeing a small part of your life you take these things as serious, you take these things being real and true and you react to them. Reacting to them means that you believe in them that they are real and true for you. Therefore you’ve got to change something or fix something or resolve something or get even with someone, why? What difference does it make? Awaken to reality.
Leave everyone alone especially your own body. Leave it alone. Do what you have to do and leave it alone. There is no confusion. There is nothing. And again nothing means nothing. You are para-nothing, beyond nothing.
What is disturbing you? Many of you would like to change their lives for you still believe that if things were different you’d be much happier. If you had your way you’d be so much more peaceful, so much happier. This will never happen. You cannot change what you are inside by changing conditions. Everything is right just the way it is. Leave everything alone. Accept life. By becoming radiantly peaceful and happy just the way you are, right now. In spite of so-called conditioning.
Some of you believe you are lonely. Some of you believe you are poverty stricken.
Some of you believe that you are in ill-health. Some of you believe that you are very healthy. Some of you believe that you are very secure, you have plenty of funds. They’re all impostors. It’s all a game that you are playing with yourself. It never came from anywhere. It doesn’t exist. But yet you identify with your body to such an extent that everything looks real. You therefore believe that if you had this instead of that you’d be very happy. But that is not the case. The people who have what you want are also worrying and fretting and have their own so-called problems in their life. You can only become happy and peaceful when you have no desires. Accept everything the way it is. Just the way it is.
The good and the bad so-called, the right and the wrong just accept everything. Do not evaluate it. Do not judge it. Do not try to change it. Just be.
You’re going to have to wake up one day. Why not do it right now? The only reason you believe it’s hard is because you’re not living spontaneously. You’re living in time and space. When you live spontaneously there is no room for anything else. Therefore all of your yesterdays are gone, your tomorrows do not exist. There is no room in spontaneity to worry or to fret or to think, if you’re truly living spontaneously. It means you’re living in every second. When you live in every second where is the time to think. Where is the time to judge. Where is the time to get angry. Trying to convert somebody or convince somebody of anything. There is no place and there’s no time to do all that. But when you live in time then all the thoughts come to you about yesterday, worries come to you about tomorrow and you have to make decisions. And you have likes and dislikes. All these things take place in time and space.
Again when you live spontaneously time and space do not exist for you. For you are living fully every second. Every second you exist. You do not exist as anything special.
You do not exist as a man or a woman. You simply exist. And in that spontaneity you are the universe. But as soon as you break away from it you become an individual once more.
You become a body and a mind and you see others as bodies and minds. But when you’re living in that spontaneity there is no space there is no room for anything. You have become absolute freedom. That freedom is not for yourself. For if you know freedom then it’s not freedom. There is no one left to know anything when you’re living spontaneous. The knower has been transcended.
What more is there to say. Anything else that I say will become redundant.
(silence)
If you’d like to ask questions, go ahead. See if I care. (laughter) SX: Robert, according to what you’re saying, life doesn’t have any purpose in itself?
R: Yes. As long as you don’t ask me a question like Bob Saliman, “Where does the seminal fluid go?” (SH: Where does what go?) Seminal fluid. (SH: Oh.) (students laugh) S: I have a question. (R: Sure.) Before I ask it I know what your answer would probably be.
Who wants to know? (laughter) My question is this and the more I think about it the less important it seems. And there is no answer but what the question I thought from time to time was, why did Krishna Murti spend so much time with intellectuals? When almost everything he said is very difficult to understand through the finite mind. In fact I have a tape of a talk by him in which he says, “Do not except what the speaker is saying. The speaker has no authority whatsoever. He is not a teacher. He is not a guru. For if he is a teacher then you are the follower and if you are the follower you destroy yourself and the teacher.” Now the meaning of that doesn’t spring readily to mind.
But he did spend a lot of time with intellectuals. And what I decided at this point is that it’s just one of those things that’s for the finite mind…there is nobody to understand it and I just think of other things that Masters have done that don’t seem to make sense. Which would be the case with him spending a lot of time with intellectuals. Now I don’t know whether you want to comment or not, I don’t believe that it calls for any comment but if you have some…
R: Why try to figure out what Krishna Murti did? (SF: Sir?) Why try to understand what Krishna Murti did? (SF: That’s what I’m saying there is no use, the whole thing-there is really no point in really talking about it…) All those things clog up your mind. (SF: It’s a waste of time to even to discuss it.) Drop it!
Fred (SF): Okay I’ll drop it. Trying but…I dropped it because even before I asked the question I said it was a waste of time. (students laugh) Which you covered earlier.
R: There have been so many teachers on this earth and there still are many teachers on this earth. Do not try to figure out who is what and what is who. Just be the observer. Do not get involved. Listen and do nothing. As I said before if you live spontaneously there will be no time to think about these things.
(Something happens, seems Fred leaves room students comment and joke) SH: Don’t worry, he’ll be back not to worry. (laughter) (SM: He didn’t disappear. (laughter) (R: He dissolved.) (laughter) (SV: Not for long.) (laughs)SK: I got a crazy question too, I think. What you were saying before it was about awakening without the conditions, without being conditioned. Forget your conditions just awaken go beyond it right, so…
R: If you’re conditioned you cannot awaken. You have to be unconditioned to awaken. (SK: That’s a huge thing, a paradox.) As long as you’re filled with thoughts and feelings and emotions and opinions, this keeps you from awakening. (SK: Yeah okay I can see that.) You have to just drop everything. (SK: Right that is the problem. That is the hard part.
That’s the part I don’t see…) If you try to live in the moment in the split second of eternity there will be no time and no space to think about anything or to be anywhere. (SK: I can see that when I’m centered.) So stay centered and whenever your mind starts to think grab it, choke it, kill it. Stop it!
Most of us when we begin to think we forget about all the teachings, we forget about everything and the thoughts take over completely. And it leads to other thoughts and other thoughts. What we’re supposed to do is to grab the thoughts when they begin and put a stop to them. Thoughts are like weeds. If you do not stop them they will grow over everything. They’ll take over everything. As soon as you feel the thoughts coming on whether they’re good or bad or indifferent. Stop the thoughts anyway you can. Just by thinking about stopping the thoughts, the thoughts stop.
Fred (SF): Sir… (R: Umm.) I’ve had a kind of a breakthrough. Last Christmas when you told us to give ten dollars to a needy person made me uncomfortable. I’ve never been comfortable around beggars or so-called homeless or these vagrants. People lying in the street they’ve always made me uncomfortable. But recently I found out something that seems to work. Interra, what she does is she find out how much she wants to give each day and I read recently that in an authoritative book that maybe we should give to the needy and give to the deserving and to the undeserving because there is no way to tell the difference. So I decided that I’d do that and I figured out each day how much I wanted to give. And I give to the first person who asks me or to someone who looks like they could use a little help. And it kind of helped because those people don’t bother me like they used to. And this has really been great.
In fact yesterday I gave a dollar to a ??? black and he smiled and said thank you. And it made me feel good and the main thing is that the whole situation doesn’t bug me like it did. I don’t even know why I share this kind of stuff.
SV: It’s good stuff. (SF: Sir?) Good stuff. Glad you did. (SF: It’s nice because up to now those people made me very uncomfortable and there’s a hell of a lot of them…) R: If you have to think about it there is ego involved. Again you must be spontaneous. If you see a homeless person comes into your life you either do something or you don’t, but do not stop to think about it. (SF: Well I used to think about it but now I’ve decided hell I’ll just give them a little something to give.) If you think about it, it means that you’re trying to be a good person. To chalk up some points for God or something like that. Then you’re just kidding yourself. Always be spontaneous in everything you do. (SF: That’s an order.) Right.
Fred (SF): Actually I don’t think I’m trying to be a good person I’m just trying to get rid of this negative attitude towards that. And it’s worked up to now. (R: But there are too many thoughts involved.) Okay I’ll try to stop them, drop them! No thoughts of any kind is the goal. (R: No thoughts of any kind.)
SH: The spontaneity eliminates that being anyone that is doing something?
R: Yes. (SH: So it’s free and natural.) True. Exactly. (SH: Umm.) When you think about it then the ego is doing it. (SH: Then you’re back in the soup.) You’re trying to do a good deed.
SK: Maybe it could even be - maybe Fred what he was saying was, he was happy because he was more comfortable. Trying to get comfortable. (SH: But who is getting comfortable, that’s the ego again.) Right. Good deeds are comfortable. (SH: I know. It’s not spontaneous.) SX: What is the use for the mind?
R: No use at all. (students laugh) Totally useless. The mind is really a conglomeration of thoughts. The mind is made up of thoughts. Thoughts of your past and worries about the future.
SD: So what you’re saying, would put a whole new slant on, “if you don’t use it, you lose it, right?” (laughter)
R: You want to lose it. (laughter) But most people think that if they don’t think, if they don’t have a mind they’ll be a vegetable. On the contrary you will be your Self.
SK: So getting comfortable or not getting comfortable is just thoughts again? More thoughts? (R: Yes. It’s all thoughts.)
Jorge (SR): I guess there should be no motivations or reactions?
R: No, exactly. The ego lives motivated. It’s the ego who goes through all of these things. (SR: I guess there is a fear that if I act spontaneously without a chance to censor that then I’m living dangerously. Because I’m making these acts of others will have their feelings hurt or I maybe… (laughter) It is Jorge who thinks that. That you may have your feelings hurt or this may happen or that may happen. Those thoughts have to go. If you are spontaneous then something beautiful will happen by itself. Where there are no thoughts involved whatsoever. (SR: From your experience do actions that come from no motivation do they tend to be sensitive to the feelings of others? Or do they seem to be willy nilly, sometimes sensitive and sometimes insensitive?) It depends on the condition, what’s happening. Sometimes they’re sensitive, sometimes they’re not but it’s all spontaneous. (SR: Sometimes there are legal acts, sometimes they are illegal acts?) (laughter) No I wouldn’t say that. There are no acts. (SR: Right, but this happens?) There’s just plain existence. (SR: But the policeman observing may see an act?) Well let the policeman figure out what to do with it. (SR: Well now maybe we’ll be behind bars living spontaneously?) (students laugh) If you find yourself behind bars you’re not living spontaneously. (laughter) You think you are.SR: I think we have to be willing to be behind bars and you have to be willing to let anything happen. Whatever happens happens. You must be willing to lose all your money, your wife, anything. In order to live spontaneously right?
R: When you live spontaneously what is supposed to happen will happen. All these things you are saying is true to an extent but it will not necessarily work that way.
Whatever is supposed to take place will take place by itself. Everything will happen the way it’s supposed to.
Jorge (SR): I guess thinking prevents what is supposed to take place to take place. (R: Exactly!) And I guess it kind of follows up predestination right?
R: Predestination is working on the level of the relative world. In the relative world, the relative universe there is predestination. But when you go beyond the relative there is no predestination. Therefore if you go beyond the relative there are no mistakes.
You no longer live in a world where you do good or bad, right or wrong, you go to jail or you don’t go to jail. (SR: Power to the judge Robert.) What’s that? (SR: Power to the judge.) (students laugh) When the time comes I will.
SP: So the same applies for education and going to acupuncture school and things like that? (R: Yes.) Getting all this knowledge and information is a useless endeavor?
R: It’s a useless endeavor in the long run. But while you’re living in this world everything you do seems important. (SP: Then there must be an application of a practical thought, for the use of a practical thought?) It is not practical thought really, it’s Maya. It’s the grand illusion that moves you. That makes you believe you are using practical thought, that makes you believe that what you’re doing is important. This is all the Maya.
SP: But I’m not referring to a personal self getting the self out of the way. For instance if I have to go out and repair the car. If I start the car and it doesn’t start if I hadn’t used correct memory - memory is important to function in society - and if I use memory correctly and I go out and lift up the lid and then I check the battery cable and then make sure there is a connection I maybe clean the points whatever little bit of knowledge I know about and that’s practical knowledge.
R: Yes. If you’re living spontaneously you will do the same thing but without being caught up in the act of doing. (SP: But Robert if you didn’t have any thoughts you wouldn’t have an idea of all this. That comes with memory and experience. If you have no memory you can’t know about a cup of tea or I need some food?) You have what is called memory in spontaneity.
(SP: Pardon?) You have what is called memory in spontaneity. In spontaneity you know what to do. You’re doing something in the second, in the moment. You’re doing what you have to do, what has to be done will be done. But you will not be the doer. (SP: I understand. But when I said practical thought, there is just practical thought there is just no person in it, it’s just functioning, except not only tea, if you just have to go fix the battery, you just fix the battery.) Yes. I guess it’s what you call practical thought. To have practical thought there has to be a thinker who has practical thought. It’s just a name. What you’re saying is true. But it’s just the terms you’re using that I disagree with. Because to have practical thought there has to be a person that thinks practically in the moment. And yet when the mind is gone
there is just spontaneity that takes place without practical thought. What you call practical thought and what I call nothing is the same thing I suppose. (SP: With all the language of the same thing and if you didn’t have that kind of tool to help communicate verbally there would be no communication.) Communication will take place as long as you’re living in the relative world. All these things will happen by themselves.
SP: What I’m saying is if you didn’t have language you couldn’t communicate. So there has to be thought as a tool that’s used even if the mind is silent. Even if that’s so, there is still a tool that is used by something else.
R: True it’s not thought. It’s consciousness. Consciousness is always in effect, always working, always doing something. Yet you can go beyond consciousness and still fix your car and do whatever has to be done. Everything will be done without taking thought.
SP: But I’m not saying about taking thought I’m just saying it’s a useful tool. We originally started this because of the mention about acupuncture or in any school what you study. Those are tools to function within the world.
R: Whatever you’re doing is necessary at the time. So if you’re going to acupuncture school this is what you’re doing but this is all on the relative plane. All this is taking place in the relative world. When you are beyond thought, beyond words it will still take place but it will be completely different.
Fred (SF): We take the case of a child prodigy at nine years old playing the piano beautifully. The child is not playing the piano the piano is being played, is that…?
R: The piano is being played, yes, true, that’s a good point.
SV: (Student talks about his experience with a pigeon while driving) R: All is well.
(silence)
Do we have any announcements?
We’re having the bhandara on the 26th, Sunday. Somebody should coordinate that.
We need a coordinator. Any coordinators around?
SL: Robert is it possible for us to just have a sign off sheet or just to bring whatever would you be comfortable with that. People bring whatever they want to.
R: You can being whatever you want to but unless we coordinate it people may bring the same things. (SL: Well wouldn’t we have a sign off sheet?) Sure. Why don’t you take charge of that? (SL: Umm, I’m…usually I don’t come on Sunday.) We’ll all play it by ear.
Whatever happens, happens. (laughter)
(Coordination of bhandara continues)
R: Okay, I’ll go along with that. (SK: Is it 1 o’clock?) It’s 1 o clock.
We have prashad…
(tape ends)
Absätze ohne Sprecherpräfix gehören dem zuletzt genannten Sprecher — so steht es im Buch, wo der Präfix nur den Anfang einer Rede markiert. Die Zuordnung ist eine Folgerung dieser Ausgabe. Namen in Klammern sind aus dem Text erschlossen: sicher belegt sind SM = Mary, SF = Fred, SJ = Jay, SC = Nate, wahrscheinlich SG = Glen, SR = Jorge. Alle anderen Kürzel bleiben stehen, weil der Beleg nicht trägt.